Month: April 2010

The Frustrating Resilience of Early Marriage in Sub-Saharan Africa

The Frustrating Resilience of Early Marriage in Sub-Saharan Africa

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By Conor Godfrey

This week the Swedish ambassador to Tanzania, Mr. Staffan Herrstrom, spoke to the Tanzanian daily The Citizen about early and/or forced marriage in Tanzanian society.

He spoke poignantly about his conversations with girls and young women across Tanzania, and outlined some of the social repercussions of forcing girls to wed at such a young age.

Mr. Herrstrom prescribes the following remedies:

· Prevent early marriages, not least by raising the marriage age for girls to the same as for boys: 18 years.

• Prevent early pregnancies i.e. by providing counseling and qualified education on sexual and reproductive health and rights.

• Make sure that all stakeholders, including the police, treat sexual abuse as the crime that it is – and the girl victims as the victims they are. Never ever doubling their burden by forcing them to marry the villains.

• Make sure that every single girl get the right to high quality education – regardless of marriages and pregnancies.

In so far as the ambassador’s ideas support education, I support them.

However, most of these fixes attempt to change an outcome without addressing the context that supports that outcome.

If early-marriage were an issue in Western Europe, it would only take a few years to eliminate the problem.

The health teacher would make sure young women understood the biology of pregnancy, as well as how to use various contraceptives.

Ideally, parents would then reinforce these messages at home and offer guidance and support in topsy-turvey world of teen-dating.

These young ambitious women would also recognize how a sexually transmitted infection or unwanted pregnancy would make their goals harder if not impossible to reach, and hence take ownership of their own choices and sexuality.

This sounds so effortless because the Western European culture supports each step of the process.

In the sub-Saharan bush, even if birth control were available on every corner, even if the law were to make it illegal to marry younger than 18, and even if police were instructed to penalize abuse harshly– I do not think much would change.

The law means nothing unless it reflects valid cultural attitudes.

Perhaps in societies where the rule of law prevails, legal codes have more transformative power, but in the Tanzanian bush, I doubt the official law book means very much.

Here is how I would recommend changing the cultural scaffolding in order to make Ambassador Herrstrom’s first three remedies more potent.

Increase women’s access to credit

: Women’s financial dependence on men supports the status quo. Women are not only better stewards of money, but also more likely to spend that money on family priorities.

Increase women’s access to training for marketable skills

: Financial literacy, artisan skills, agriculture, foreign language, etc… Fathers and family members will be less likely to marry a young daughter into another family if she is a financial contributor.
Health and Sanitation

: Prosperity starts with reasonable health. Reasonably nourished, healthy young women will succeed more often than their mal-nourished peers. They will also work more efficiently, leaving more time for studying and/or income generating activities.

Education

: I could not agree more with the ambassador. A quality primary and secondary education does more to change the cultural context than anything else.

For some, these suggestions will appear to attack the problem of early marriage too obliquely, but I am convinced that is the most effective way.

My friends and family tend to look at early marriage as a strictly moral issue. This characterization, though not without substance, tends to generate blunt solutions.

Outlaw it. Punish Offenders. Declare it in violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Ok—but realize that most of the parents who marry their daughters off too young are not evil.

For the most part– neither are the men they marry.

The cultural context that informs their life can absorb and adapt to new information, take stock of changing realities, and chart a new course forward.

That cultural fluidity makes diversity fascinating, and sub-Saharan Africa one of the most exciting places on the planet.

The end of early marriage cannot be willed, or declared into existence. It must work its way through that cultural matrix until one day it becomes painfully obvious that such a practice no longer corresponds to social needs and realities. Unfortunately, this may take generations.

African Film-making in Flux

African Film-making in Flux

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By Conor Godfrey

Any Westerner visiting the West African bush will most likely report that two things surprised them the most—the number of people with cell phones, and the number of video clubs.

Villages that boast narry a pump or health clinic will often have a video club.

The video clubs are simple affairs.

Some entrepreneurial soul scratched up enough money for a generator, small television, and a supply of horrible American action movies poorly dubbed into French.

(Thus propagating the belief that while people are all martial arts experts)

My Village Video Club in Guinea
While Chuck Norris and Jean Claude van Dam drew a steady crowd every night in my village, the films that packed the video club to the rafters were the local films in Pulaar ( largest local language in Guinea).

There is a huge market for local stories tackling indigenous themes across the continent.

The African film scholar Mbye Cham observed that “…cinema by Africans has grown steadily over this short period of time to become a significant part of a worldwide film movement aimed at constructing and promoting an alternative popular cinema, one that is more in harmony with the realities, the experiences, the priorities and desires of the society which it addresses.”

The presence and popularity of these local films in my tiny Guinean village is indicative of a continental trend.

Digital technology now allows film-makers and musicians to avoid the costly hurdles of professional production.

Nigeria’s Nollywood puts out more films every year then Hollywood or Bollywood using these low cost techniques.

The Africans who manage to find financial backing for a major production often do well on the film festival scene for one or two years before their movie tumbles into irrelevance.

While digital technology makes production affordable, it tends to produce low quality films with stilted acting.

Most Nollywood films tell hackneyed rags to riches story pivoting on a supernatural object or being.

They remind me of the plot repetitions in American soap operas or reality T.V. spin offs.

I think this is just the beginning.

As Lucy Gebre-Egziabher says in her article on the effect of digital technology on African film, “…we must acknowledge and learn from the achievements of these new directors. They have demonstrated that producing African films, in general, is a viable business and have elicited healthy investment from Africa’s conservative business sector”.

The strength of this market will inevitably improve production quality.

Amateur producers who tackle relevant local themes in new and creative ways will be rewarded by more sales and more investment, while producers who fail to improve will plateau.

For those who live in the New York area and have never seen African film written and directed by Africans—take an afternoon between April 7th and 13th to see the world through African eyes.

African Film Celebrating 50 Years of Independence: April 7th – 13th

African Film Celebrating 50 Years of Independence: April 7th – 13th

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By Conor Godfrey

This week the African Film Festival kicks off in New York City, at the Walter Reade Theater in Lincoln Center. (April 7th- 13th ).

The 19th annual festival explores the theme “Independent Africa”, as 17 different African nations celebrate their independence in 2010.

This exploration will include a mélange of classic and contemporary African cinema and art, as well as a series of panel discussions on current trends in African visual arts.

The general public can pay per film or event ($9-$12), or buy an all access pass ($99) at the Walter Reade Theater box office.

The festival program offers a wide variety of shorts and feature length films written by Africans living on the continent as well as in the diaspora.

Here are a few of the critics’ favorites:

From a Whisper: Director and script writer Wanuri Kahlu’s From a Whisper won the coveted ‘Best Narrative Feature” award at this year’s Pan-African Film Festival in Los Angelus. The film explores the 1998 bombing of the U.S. Embassy from an African perspective.

L’Absence and Burning in the Sun: Both of these films examine the experience of an African emigrant returning home. I find these stories fascinating across all cultures, but particularly in Africa. What does home mean to these emigrants when they return? How does total immersion in Western Culture affect the emigrants African identity?

Sex, Okra, and Salted Butter: Another decorated African film that delves into the immigrant experience. In Mahamat-Seleh Haround’s comedy, a traditional Cameroonian man must deal with the flight of his wife, the discovery of his son’s non-traditional sexuality, and life in Paris’ black community.

I note these films because of their critical acclaim, but there are over 40 films on the program. Many of these films make their U.S. debut this week.

Righting Old Wrongs Does Not Need to Destroy the Economy

Righting Old Wrongs Does Not Need to Destroy the Economy

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By Conor Godfrey

All countries with a colonial history struggle with the psychological and economic impact of colonialism.

In many African countries, colonial masters empowered one people group over another and left a legacy of racial or tribal inequality that persists to this day.

This legacy is particularly potent in South Africa, where the gap between haves and have-nots remains among the worst in the world.

Inequality Map 2004

Dealing with inequality is a complicated and emotional issue. As I see it, African governments can frame policies aimed at addressing inequality in two ways– righting old wrongs, or growing the economy.

Zimbabwe recently revived its 2007 Indigenous and Empowerment Act aimed at redistributing wealth and skills to indigenous Zimbabweans.

This is clearly of the ‘righting old wrongs’ variety, much like the government’s efforts at land reform over the last decade.

In 2000, the government participated in the seizure of 110,000 Sq Kilometers of farmland for redistribution.

Many of these farmers were neither re-settled nor reimbursed.

These ill-fated land reforms further eviscerated the production capacity of the former “bread Basket of South Africa”, and their memory casts a long shadow over the present indigenous empowerment legislation.

The current manifestation of the Indigenization and Empowerment Act would require foreign owned businesses valued over US$500,000 to sell or cede 51% of their business to indigenous Zimbabweans.

It would also require all companies to “procure 50 % of all [their] goods and services… from a business in which a controlling interest is held by indigenous Zimbabweans.” (Text of Indigenization and Empowerment Act)

Businesses and investors are fleeing for the hills.

The head of a large German investment group, Andreas Wenzel, was quoted as saying that, “Prompted by the recently introduced regulations… the German-Southern African Chamber of Industry and Commerce in Johannesburg are putting on hold their plans to bring German investors to Zimbabwe”.

Contrast this with South Africa’s Broad Based Black Economic Empowerment initiative (BBBEE).

The Department of Trade and Industry claims that Black empowerment and growth go hand in hand in South Africa—”This will only be possible if our economy builds on the full potential of all persons and communities across the length and breadth of this country.”

While the ANC has been guilty of populist pandering in the past, I do not believe that this policy deserves that criticism.

The BBBEE in South Africa rates companies on a BBBEE scorecard, awarding points for the percentage of Black senior managers, owners, and employees, as well as awarding companies points for doing business with other high scoring companies.

If you want to do business with the government (a huge purchaser of goods and services in the South African economy), then you must score well.

In this way, the South African government uses their buying power to encourage companies to find qualified black personnel and business partners.

From 2000 to 2008, BBBEE transactions accounted for 200 billion Rand.

Even though claims of reverse discrimination abound, the South African government rightly understands that developing the human capital of the entire rainbow nation is crucial to the country’s growth and success.

Righting old wrongs by throwing untrained and under financed indigenous people on previously profitable land, or forcing shotgun weddings between foreign firms and potentially unprepared indigenous partners, will only make everyone poorer.

Let South Africa Handle Mugabe

Let South Africa Handle Mugabe

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Robert Mugabe
Morgan Tsvangirai

By Conor Godfrey

Just as American and European governments have asked friends and allies to follow their lead in years past on issues of concern to the West, South Africa is now asking for the West to follow its lead on an issue near and dear to their hearts—Zimbabwe.

I find it hard to get a bead on affairs in Zimbabwe because the pendulum swings from disaster, to optimism, to nagging pessimism, and back faster than you can minimize Al-Jazeera and open up the BBC.

Two years ago, the country had a raging cholera epidemic, 230 million percent inflation, and risked becoming a failed state.

The power sharing agreement signed in 2008 pleased no one but stopped the country’s descent into chaos and offered a refreshing break from the monotony of Robert Mugabe’s 30 year reign.

Then the news turned bad again. Snags in the rather loathsome shotgun wedding between Mugabe’s ZANU-PF and Morgan Tsvangirai’s MDC threatened to derail progress.

But last week the news was good. Jacob Zuma’s shuttle diplomacy appeared to have finally paid off.

Mugabe’s Zimbabwe African ZANU-PF and Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) agreed to implement a series of measures to break through the current diplomatic impasse. (Outstanding issues include unresolved disputes over gubernatorial appointees, sanctions, and the swearing in of MDC Agricultural Minister Roy Bennett)

This week the news is bad.

A member of ZANU-PF told the press that his party would not take the agreed steps until Western governments remove sanctions (mostly travel restrictions and an asset freeze on Mugabe and his top officials).

In recent days, this official claimed that he only reiterated the party’s past position, but it certainly seems that ZANU-PF will continue to play the part of the obstructionist.

This is maddening. Robert Mugabe is largely responsible for Zimbabwe’s current state of affairs.

His thugs intimidate opposition members, his policies deter investment, and his mere presence makes potential foreign donors think twice about getting involved.

Lifting sanctions on Mugabe and his family would taste awful, but pragmatism often does.

I realize that the withdrawal of protest-sanctions lends quasi-legitimacy to an obstructionist regime, seems like playing politics with human rights, and undermines the Western claim to “always stand on the side of freedom and human dignity”. (President Obama’s 2010 State of the Union)

It’s a distasteful business.

However, Western governments lack adequate leverage to follow another course.

South Africa on the other hand has both vested interests and powerful leverage.

Zimbabwe is an important exporter to South Africa as well as the biggest buyer of South African exports in the Southern African Development Community.

Furthermore, conflict, epidemics, and refugees do not respect state borders. For these reasons, South Africa would like its Northern neighbor to return to stability and prosperity as soon as possible.

If Jacob Zuma says that sanctions should be lifted, we should lift them.

If the U.S. and U.k. governments need to hold their nose while doing so to appease their domestic audience, so be it.

But they should get out of South Africa’s way.

This suggestion is open to the criticism that South Africa has yet to deliver. But neither have Western sanctions.

As the region’s economic and political powerhouse, South Africa has far more at stake than we do. The U.K and the U.S. should encourage the growth of South Africa as a regional power broker by trusting its government to act responsibly in the interest of stability and growth in Southern Africa.